Sermons on sowing seeds

We are grains of wheat. That is what we are. We can stay by ourselves, alone and rigid, encased in a hard shell, holding the embryo of what could be, of what God could be through us and deep within us, imprisoned by our unwillingness to let go of those things we hold to be safe and true through our understanding of ourselves, each other, or God.
Or, we can die to ourselves and we can become the bread of life, giving life and nourishment to others and bearing much fruit for the Kingdom. “Come and die”, Jesus says.

At the deepest level, however, the Sermon is not primarily a set of rules or directives. At the deepest level, the Sermon on the Mount is an act of imagination – and a rather wild and crazy act of imagination at that. In the Sermon, Jesus reimagines the world and invites us, the church, to live into this new, alternative reality.

Our gospel story contains an invitation to trust that when we do bear fruit into the kingdom, when we do treasure what we have found to bring us joy, when we have met the needs of others, even if others don’t carry it forward, or value it as we do or did, we can trust that God does. When we live into the mission of God, and we tirelessly give of ourselves in creating whatever it is, a family, a ministry, a sense of hope within a community, we take our best step forward, and then leave the rest with God.

Or perhaps you are thinking of our church community and understanding that what makes us the rich and fruitful parish we are, the small parish who yields much fruit, is that those who are able to sow, sow; those who at this time in their lives need to feed on and consume the good news for themselves, like the birds, are able to do so; that those who are in a rocky place, who have nothing to give away at the moment, don’t need to, for the yield from others can carry them along. Perhaps that’s what being an expression of the Body of Christ is all about.